This handbook was designed to help adult literacy education teachers to understand the plastics industry, develop a curriculum, and teach basic skills classes in a plastics company. The book contains four main sections. The first section, on the basics of plastics, contains a brief history of the industry, an elementary description of the processes and materials used, and information on environmental and safety issues related to the plastics industry. The second section provides some ideas for developing curriculum materials and some samples that can be adapted. In the third section, comments from workplace educators detail what has and what has not worked in the workplace. This section covers not only curriculum design but also many aspects of the workplace. The final section, a glossary, contains definitions of terms that are encountered in the plastics industry. The materials are illustrated with line drawings. An appendix section outlines the workplace education program at NYPRO, Inc. (Contains 11 references.) (KC)